104.4 HOL - NPO Radio 1 - Goes/Alticom Toren (zee) - NPO_R1__ - Received in Clacton, Walton-on-the-Naze, Suffolk/Essex borders on A12, and everywhere in-between. Not once received in East Harling, but frequent tropo guest in East Norfolk.
101.9 HOL - Sky Radio - Goes/Alticom Toren (zee) - No RDS - Received in Clacton and Walton on the Naze. Occasionally in East Harling via tropo, but more frequent in East Norfolk (most often blocked by Classic FM Peterborough). Thanks to DSP, Town 102 reduced, but Town is still a pest! RDS would be present if it wasn't for Town, as NPO R1 has its RDS!
96.6 BEL - RTBF Pure FM - Anderlues/Mont-Sainte-Geneviève (wal-hnt) - PURE_FM_ + RT, and scrolling PS text. - Received in Walton on the Naze.
102.4 HOL - Radio 538 - Westdorpe/Verkavelingsweg (zee) - No RDS. Received in Walton on the Naze. Presume TX Westdorpe, or maybe Roosendaal, but Westdorpe more likely. Vocal ID. Came in to fight against Stoke Holy Cross. Not once received in Norfolk or Suffolk, thanks to Heart from Stoke Holy Cross, on the same frequency. First time ever received by me.
93.7 BEL - VRT Radio 2 (Vlaams-Brabant) - Sint-Pieters-Leeuw/Norkring Toren (vlg-vbr) - Crystal clear, in stereo, with RDS "RADIO_2_". On local stations list. Received in Walton on the Naze.
100.7 HOL - Q-music - IJsselstein/Gerbrandytoren-Alticom (utr) - Received in Walton on the Naze. "Q-music_".
93.4 HOL - Radio Rijnmond - Rotterdam/Alticom Toren (Waalhaven) (zho) - Received in Frinton. No RDS. 538, from same site, also present, with RDS "RADIO538".

Many more, including Calais, Lille (Bouvigny), Tournai, IJsselstein, and who knows what else? A lot of UNID Belgian and French locals, including one (pirate?) with Dutch speaking scrolling RDS-PS text, at the top of band between 107 and 108.

Good reception. That Ford car radio seems to be doing very well.
I wonder what length of whip you have on the car roof?
Mine has only a 350mm whip, with some spiral winding (loading?). I would like to change it for a 700mm to 770mm whip (1/4 wave resonant on 3m) but most on ebay seem to be short 'bee-stings'; "Gives excellent FM reception". Oh no it does not!
Mine has a 6mm male thread on the bottom of the whip. Plenty with adaptors to suit that but all too short.

I am interested in the Ned/Bel 'little' station, possible "(pirate?)", that you heard.
I wonder what frequency it was on, please?
If you check my log, you will see that I like receiving the 'little' stations.

Great log Alex. Once again the conditions didn't reach this far up the coast.

I haven't checked my car antenna to see if it unscrews. To be honest, I didn't think they could be unscrewed. It was impossible to shift the Megane whip. As with the Megane, the C4GP has a spiral wound whip. It's actually smaller than the Megane's at only 12 inches long, sloping backwards by about 30 degrees. I just went out to see if it would unscrew but I will need stepladders to reach it.

I found that a 2m whip gave better results in the Megan's car radio when used on a mag-mount and into the standard radio via an adaptor.

Dutch pirates are many. I used to hear lots of them here, especially on 96.5, 97.0 and 97.3, but they are rare these days. I wonder if the authorities clamped down on the powers used? Check the following websites for web streams http://geheimezender.com/Piraten_Streams.php and you can also refer to the latest pirate logs here http://www.ontvangst.org/rapport/overzicht.php It doesn't look like there's any activity today. Usually you will see half a dozen or more pirates listed on the first page, together with frequencies.

Regarding car aerials when I bought a Peugeot 206 it had a small excuse for an aerial so I went to a scrapyard and got 2 long whips ans was a strait swap and reception was much better.
Then when someone decided to put there car across my path boom car was written off so I got a Renault Clio which had small whip as I had a long spare whip but the base has a different size screw hole so I knocked up and adaptor and then it was better the only problem was as the Clio did not have a tilting base like the 206 I have to take it off when putting in the garage.

a2c39a wrote:
Good reception. That Ford car radio seems to be doing very well.
I wonder what length of whip you have on the car roof?

I read that the OEM antenna on most Ford cars (including that Focus Mk. III) is 550 mm length. Unfortunately, it could be better, as it may be modest gain, due to the fact it can receive DAB broadcasts. I'm keeping the original antenna, as I may want to do a DAB bandscan (or of course, including DAB+, but the car radio can only decode MP2, so the DAB+ (HE-AAC) broadcasts are silent.) in an area. I have once got the Nederlandse Publieke Omroep mux on 12C, up Kett's Hill in Norwich, a good DX hotspot in Norwich. I would've got the "DAB+" mux (it is called DAB+, and has Dutch commercial stations) as well, but I did not know the frequencies. NPO is so much more difficult in Breckland, due to Cambridge mux. Cambridgeshire appear to be selfish (lol), as they mainly pick frequencies with Dutch stuff on, e.g. on FM, Gunthorpe (near Peterborough) uses 538's Rotterdam frequency (102.7) for the local version of Heart (Hereward FM before it was took over by Heart). It's really just a coincidence, and the reference to selfish Cambridgeshire was a joke. Not many people in the UK care about Dutch radio, nor are any supposed to listen to Dutch radio, as the UK has its own stations, but DXing kinda defeats the object of a radio station's intended coverage area.

a2c39a wrote:
I am interested in the Ned/Bel 'little' station, possible "(pirate?)", that you heard.
I wonder what frequency it was on, please?
If you check my log, you will see that I like receiving the 'little' stations.

Good DX.

Best wishes,
John.

It was most likely on 107.2, 107.4 or 107.6 MHz. I like the little stations as well. Rijnmond is probably the only Netherlands-based local I've got (apart from the UNID "pirate?", which I think is more likely Belgian), with about 12 kW from Rotterdam, on 93.4. That was in Suffolk and Essex, again in the same Ford, never once got it at home. Now I have the XDR, Rijnmond should come up in nice tropo in Harling. It was originally swamped by Wrotham, but that was on the unmodified Sony 920, as just plain static is heard on 93.4 with the XDR. I wish you luck with Radio Royaal (The Hague) on 99.4, but that would be possible with the XDR, even though Tacolneston will give it a hard time!

I am wondering if you had VBRO from Nieuwpoort-aan-Zee in Belgium if it was 107.2? This is a legal station and one of many on the network. They play Dutch music and could perhaps be confused for a pirate.

Dutch pirates tend to use specific frequencies and I doubt they would use anything around those frequencies for fear of causing interference to all the locals up there. The VBRO transmitter in Diksmuide is the usual suspect on 107.3, closely followed by Poperinge on 107.5 and Torhout on 107.9. There is also one in Oostende on 104.5 which gets though here occasionally. I wonder if you had the 107.3, or maybe even 107.2 outlet.

I agree with John, I don't think you heard a pirate Alex.
I think it was just one of the 'little' stations. Many of them are on frequencies at the top of the band, between 107.0 and 108.0.
The ones I receive almost daily here on my loft mounted almost vertical yagi, are:
107.2 Radio Bingo, Roeselare (Bel)
107.5 Scheldemond FM, Oostburg (Ned)
107.6 Contact Dance, Assenede (Bel)
107.7 RGR FM, Oostkamp (Bel)

Most of the Belgie 'little' stations (above) play Dance Music and that might make them sound like a pirate to someone used to UK local stations!!

I am receiving them tonight, fading in and out.
Also 93.4 Radio Rijnmond, Rotterdam, is another, pretty much daily, regular here. Receiving it now, Run To You - Bryan Adams but I prefer the Novaspace, Dance version.

As for Radio Royaal (The Hague) on 99.4, here!!
Errr! I think not. Even an S10 cannot cope with weak signals 100kHz from Tac when Tac is only 4km away!!

Could've been VBRO, then. It had Dutch music, scrolling Dutch-language RDS-PS (think I saw 'VOOR' in there somewhere!) and still no signs of a station name. Hard to remember the frequency. It had quite high RDS level, hence the fact the RT came in? Think it did, didn't it, but might be getting confused with Pure FM from Anderlues, who also had scrolling RDS and RT, hence they had high RDS level. The tentative VBRO had faded out quickly, and the RDS went. No signs of knowing it was VBRO exactly, but that's a good guess.
Indeed, if the Belgian locals have dance, they must be nice, in my opinion. The only we have here is Kiss, but that is not the best ever, and I don't like the annoying deejays. I listened to Kiss when I was younger (approx. age 11), in fact with overlaps of early traits of the DX hobby, such as a few listens to Sky Radio from Goes. The locals in the UK are mostly rubbish (in my opinion, that is, so please don't be offended if you like them, but they are thought to be bad anyway), perhaps because the BBC is better than the VRT, in terms of programmes. Very few have interesting stuff (other than Hot AC music), and LBC (talk radio) is one of those rare ones. Forgot to mention community radio - well, I love community stations. Licensed pirates, metaphorically, some are, with similar output to the pirates. I'm talking about stations such as Smooth, Touch, Heart, Norwich 99.9, Silk 106.9, Connect, and many others. I do prefer the Bauer Place stations, as they are reminiscent of the Belgian and Dutch stations, and also DX catches, even though Viking (daily troposcatter signal) makes it every day on my setup, using the XDR-S10HDiP (and the super-narrow filters on the Onkyo 4970 as well) to avoid the QRM of the stronger, and more generic/mainstream, Hot AC station 'KLFM' from West Norfolk (Great Massingham TX).
In the Midlands, with the nuisance crowded 'chockablock' FM band, there are too many stations with similar music as their format, and many simulcast the same playlist (such as Free Radio and Signal 1). Particularly with the bugging and pointless Vodafone chart (why not listen to BBC R1 anyway?) on Sunday evenings.